Best courses in your city

[Jason Topp]

Wow! I would think that most that venture to Minneapolis for golf have their sights set on Interlachen and Hazeltine... and it seems they're missing out on a whole bunch of more interesting courses.

Thanks for posting Jason and Rick.

You cannot underestimate the value of playing courses where history was made.  I would have the same tendency when visiting other cities.  Nonetheless, since I have played Hazeltine and Interlachen many times, there are other courses I like better.

[Duncan Cheslett]

Greater Manchester, England.

1=  Reddish Vale
1=  Manchester (Hopwood)  

      then a gap...

3    Stockport
4    Heaton Park
5    North Manchester
6    Bolton Old Links
7    Romiley
8    Bramhall Park
9    Dunham Forest
10  Worsley


In the immediate outlying areas we have some fabulous courses. In no particular order;


Pleasington
Clitheroe
Wilmslow
Prestbury
Sandiway
Delamere Forest

[Chuck Glowacki]

Town of Southampton-population 56,000  (not the village-pop 3100)
In no order 1-10
Westhampton
Quogue Field Club
Southampton GC
Shinnecock
NGLA
Noyack
The Bridge
Sebonack
Bridgehampton Club
Atlantic
+
Sag Harbor GC
Poxybogue
3 Ponds
[/quot

Jeff:  I would toss Quogue and add Hampton Hills which I believe is still Southampton town

[Greg Gilson]

I'll get in with my FAVOURITES before most in the US get to their laptops:

(1)Kingston Heath
(2)RM West
(3)Victoria
(4)RM East
(5)Woodlands
(6)Yarra Yarra (Home Club...gets bonus points)
(7)Peninsula North
(8)Commonwealth
(9)Peninsula South
(10)Metropolitan

[Steve Kline]

I can't go ten deep in Cincinnati, but here is my list. Really, only the first three would I make any effort to play. I would drop everything to play Camargo, make some effort to rearrange things for Hyde Park, and would take an offer to play Clovernook before anything else. After that, if I didn't have to pay I would play them.

Camargo
Hyde Park
Clovernook
Stonelick Hills
Coldstream
Kenwood - Kendale
Maketewah (haven't seen it since a bunch of changes were made a couple of years ago)

[Tom Kelly]

My home town of Nottingham;

1. Notts (Hollinwell)
2. Sherwood Forest
3. Lindrick
4. Coxmoor
5. Worksop
6. Longcliffe (in Leicestershire but closer to the city centre than most of the courses above!)

Gap in quality

7. Wollaton
8. Radcliffe-on-Trent (should be better imo...slight bias)

Another Gap

9. Ruschcliffe
10. Mapperley

[Ally Mcintosh]

I’ll have a go at this…

I’m going for Greater Dublin / County Dublin, population approx. €1.8m

1.   Portmarnock
2.   The Island
3.   Portmarnock Links
4.   Royal Dublin
5.   Luttrelstown
6.   The Castle
7.   Corballis
8.   Hermitage
9.   St.Annes
10.   Beaverstown (purely for the greens). Otherwise The Grange

[Ricardo Ramirez Calvo]

Buenos Aires, Argentina (in no particular order):

1) Olivos
2) Jockey Club Red
3) Buenos Aires Golf Club
3) Nordelta
4) Martindale
5) Hurlingham Club
6) San Andrés
7) Praderas
Ranelagh
9) Estancias
10) Pingüinos

 

[Ben Kodadek]

Tampa/Orlando
-no particular order

Old Memorial
Streamsong Red
Streamsong Blue
Palma Ceia
Interlachen
Pine Barrens
Mountain Lake (a geographical stretch)
CC of Orlando
Isleworth
Copperhead

Southern Dunes, Lake Nona, and Rolling Oaks could also contend.  

[Matt Glore]

New Orleans Louisiana

1 Metairie CC
2 New Orleans CC
3 TPC Louisiana
4 English Turn
5 Lakewood CC
6 getting difficult now- Oak Harbor
7 Stonebridge
8 Chateau CC

[Keith OHalloran]

Town of Southampton-population 56,000  (not the village-pop 3100)
In no order 1-10
Westhampton
Quogue Field Club
Southampton GC
Shinnecock
NGLA
Noyack
The Bridge
Sebonack
Bridgehampton Club
Atlantic
+
Sag Harbor GC
Poxybogue
3 Ponds
[/quot

Jeff:  I would toss Quogue and add Hampton Hills which I believe is still Southampton town
[/quote

Chuck,
I would not agree with taking Quogue out of the list, and having read some of what Jeff has written on GCA, I bet he doesn't either! 

[jeffwarne]

Town of Southampton-population 56,000  (not the village-pop 3100)
In no order 1-10
Westhampton
Quogue Field Club
Southampton GC
Shinnecock
NGLA
Noyack
The Bridge
Sebonack
Bridgehampton Club
Atlantic
+
Sag Harbor GC
Poxybogue
3 Ponds
[/quot

Jeff:  I would toss Quogue and add Hampton Hills which I believe is still Southampton town
[/quote

Chuck,
I would not agree with taking Quogue out of the list, and having read some of what Jeff has written on GCA, I bet he doesn't either! 

you can add Hampton Hills to my + list, but not to my hometown top 10.
and Goat Hill and Gardiners Bay, despite not being governed by Southampton Town, are only a few miles by sea, and much faster for me to reach than Southampton Club from Sag Harbor.

But if we can include World Woods and Streamsong on the same "hometown" list, (2 hours apart)
my list would look quite a bit different with the inclusion of Winged Foot ,Friar's Head, Maidstone and the rest of Long Island and the dozens + courses that would blow away most lists  .
I thought I was taking liberties with the use of Southampton "Town" rather than the village

[archie_struthers]

 

Best courses in Atlantic City


IMO

Galloway National


Atlantic City
Greate Bay
Hidden Creek
Twisted Dune.


Note.  Might be slight bias , slight

[Ronald Montesano]

You'd put Cherry Hill behind Stafford?

I presume you've played Stafford?

[Ronald Montesano]

Gotta have Niagara Falls CC in there. I would also include Whirlpool and Wanakah and possibly OPCC, but can't argue with the top 3 at all.

I love the Porter Cup but the front nine of the course does absolutely nothing for me. Wanakah has too many flat holes and is defined by the interruption of trees. Whirlpool maybe, Orchard Park butchered two Travis holes, although the Ian Andrew work is promising.

[Chuck Glowacki]

Jeff:  Let's consider "your city" as the five east end towns (Riverhead, Southold, Southampton, East Hampton and Shelter Island)
        which from your location in Sag Harbor and mine in Southold would be within an hour's drive or less.  What say you now?

[Phil Lipper]

If I consider "my city" as northern Bergen County NJ and Southern Rockland County NY
Ridgewood
Hackensack
Manhattan Woods
Paramount
Arcola
nothing else worthy of the list

[jeffwarne]

Jeff:  Let's consider "your city" as the five east end towns (Riverhead, Southold, Southampton, East Hampton and Shelter Island)
        which from your location in Sag Harbor and mine in Southold would be within an hour's drive or less.  What say you now?

Who wouldn't want to add Friar's Head, Maidstone, and Goat Hill to their Top 10 list

[Chuck Glowacki]

Jeff:  Let's consider "your city" as the five east end towns (Riverhead, Southold, Southampton, East Hampton and Shelter Island)
        which from your location in Sag Harbor and mine in Southold would be within an hour's drive or less.  What say you now?

Who wouldn't want to add Friar's Head, Maidstone, and Goat Hill to their Top 10 list

and one of my personal faves Indian Island

[jeffwarne]

Jeff:  Let's consider "your city" as the five east end towns (Riverhead, Southold, Southampton, East Hampton and Shelter Island)
        which from your location in Sag Harbor and mine in Southold would be within an hour's drive or less.  What say you now?

Who wouldn't want to add Friar's Head, Maidstone, and Goat Hill to their Top 10 list

and one of my personal faves Indian Island

Touche-good catch
now's the season -when are we going?

[Steve Lapper]

If I consider "my city" as northern Bergen County NJ and Southern Rockland County NY
Ridgewood
Hackensack
Manhattan Woods
Paramount
Arcola
nothing else worthy of the list

Phil,

  Wouldn't you think about substituting Alpine for Manhattan Woods???

[Brad Tufts]

Boston, in order, within 25 miles, in my opinion:

Essex
Myopia
TCC (really interchangable with the above two)
Old Sandwich
Boston GC
Salem CC
Winchester
Concord CC (neck and neck with Winch)
Charles River
Brae Burn
Tedesco

In my Mass. rankings, Tedesco is #17...so Kittansett, Taconic, Eastward Ho, Longmeadow, Oyster Harbors, and Plymouth slot in amongst the above.  My next Boston-area course after Tedesco is Black Rock at #21 (Oak Hill, Vesper, Orchards slot in between).  Among Boston-area courses, the only prominent private courses I have not seen are Belmont and Cohasset.  In Mass. as a whole, I have not seen the Nantucket courses, Woods Hole, Worcester,  Blue Hill and a few other lesser ones.

Boston publics are a bit harder, as most of our high-end publics are in Central/Western Mass or on the Cape...too far to be considered "Boston area":

George Wright (Ross)
South Shore CC (Stiles)
Franklin Park (Ross and others before him)
Butter Brook (Mungeam)
Beverly Golf & Tennis (Stiles, maybe some Tull)
Sandy Burr (Ross)
Gannon Municipal (Stiles)
Granite Links (Sanford)
Brookline GC (Stiles)
Really stretching here as there just aren't many candidates....Fresh Pond (Walter Johnson) and Salem Muni (Stiles) are decent 9-holers but not very exciting.  Ponkapoag, if ever restored in any way would be pretty good...there are/were 18 Ross holes out there, but it might be America's worst-maintained 36 holes...which may be 27 today as I believe they have let one 9 go...unfortunately I'm pretty sure it was one of the Ross 9s.

[Tim Martin]

Hartford
1. Shuttle Meadow
2. Wampanoag
3. CC of Farmington
4. Wethersfield CC
5. Hartford GC

[Adrian_Stiff]

Bristol
1. The Players Club
2. The Kendleshire
3. Long Ashton
4. Bristol & Clifton
5. Henbury

Bath
1. Cumberwell Park R&Y
2. Cumberwell Park B&O
3=Kingsdown
3=Bath
5. Saltford

[Jim Sherma]

Harrisburg and Central PA (I am constraining this to 30 or so miles from Harrisburg/Hershey)
No order or preference is implied within the individual groupings

Top 3 and a half - very very good and something that is worth traveling for

Hershey West
Lancaster CC
CC of York
Lebanon CC (Back 9)

Next Tier - would recommend to everyone on GCA but likely not worth a longer trip by themselves

Hershey East
West Shore CC
Hershey Links and Hershey Parkview (both now NLE were in this tier)
Harrisburg CC - very quirky and interesting, early Flynn although not much left on the ground other than the routing, a lot of guys don't like it but I find that the blind shots and uneven lies make for a fun challenge

Still good and worth a day out - definitely some interest and some might really like them

Lebanon CC (Front 9 - still good, but the back is over much more interesting land)
Colonial CC
Dauphin Highlands
Royal Manchester (York, PA)
Iron Valley (Not to my taste but many like it - PB Dye)
Royal Oaks (When it's in decent shape there is some interesting golf out there)

Others that did not make the list for various reasons:

I did not include Schuylkill since it was a little outside of the range I chose - also, I have real problems with a couple of the new greens that they put in as I feel that they are very much out of character with the Ross/Park Jr course they were built upon
 
The Lancaster area has Conestoga CC and Bent Creek CC that could make the list but I have not played them at this point

I have not played Carlisle Country Club and have heard decent enough reviews to want to play it, but would be surprised if it blew me away

Outdoor Country Club of York is a course that I have heard mixed reviews about but with enough pretty good ones to get me down there at some point

The area has a good amount of decent public options, but none of them are anything special and generally are Ault/Clark or William and David Gordon somewhat generic and competent public courses that when they are in decent shape are perfectly fine and reasonably challenging places to play. However they really don't have anything special of interest to offer beyond that (Manada, Monroe Valley, Armitage, Fairview, and Cool Creek are some of the better ones).